Giovanni Ribisi
Movie Review: Papa: Hemingway in Cuba
At the beginning of Papa: Hemingway in Cuba, Ed Meyers (a lackluster Giovanni Ribisi), a thirty-something journalist with the Miami Globe in 1959, claims that Ernest “Papa” Hemingway (Adrian Sparks), saved his life. He says the author helped him become a writer and provided him with hope during an orphaned childhood. After Ed was fired for misspelling “maybe,” he stayed up nights during his probat...[Read More]
Movie Review: Ted
Aside from over-familiarity and increasingly indulgent premises, Fox’s Family Guy has been criticized lately for attempting to cram in awkward dramatic conflict and existential crises (even the dog Brian has contemplated suicide) alongside the show’s torrents of scatterbrained, scatological anti-humor and 1980s pop culture references. Making way for pandering sentimentality has done little to win ...[Read More]
Trailer Trashin’: Gangster Squad Looks to Deliver Stylish Period Crime Drama
After last week’s double-dose of superhero goodness, it’s time for something completely different. This week’s Trailer Trashin’ takes a look at director Ruben Fleischer’s cops-and-crooks film Gangster Squad. Premise: A vigilante police force within the LAPD fights to keep the East Coast Mafia, led by Mickey Cohen (Sean Penn), out of Los Angeles in the 1940s and 1950s....[Read More]
Movie Review: Contraband
You know the storyline all too well. A retired criminal must commit one last big crime before he can get out of the game for good. Countless authors and filmmakers have used this handy plot device, some more effectively than others. The bad news for Contraband, Mark Wahlberg’s latest film, is that writer Aaron Guzikowski and director Baltasar Kormákur have pumped too many tiresome clichés into thi...[Read More]
Movie Review: The Rum Diary
At one point in Bruce Robinson’s adaptation of Hunter S. Thomspon’s experiential novel The Rum Diary, a turtle with jewels glued to its shell catches the sight of American journalist Paul Kemp (Johnny Depp) – the animal is a metaphor for the wanton avarice of the tax-evading businessmen luring Paul into a scheme, but it also serves as an apt description for this pretty but slothful take on Thompso...[Read More]